How Art Can Be Good
paulgraham.com
How Art Can Be Good
The feel of things vs the think of things.
My mentor John Borthwick recently turned me to the phrase: “The truth of a thing is the feel of it, not the think of it.”
I’m thinking about how the only way to get better at making things is to make things, and to let the thinking happen inside the work – where you can judge a thing based on how it feels –... See more
My mentor John Borthwick recently turned me to the phrase: “The truth of a thing is the feel of it, not the think of it.”
I’m thinking about how the only way to get better at making things is to make things, and to let the thinking happen inside the work – where you can judge a thing based on how it feels –... See more
Things I'm thinking about
I saw someone define modern art as:
Modern art = You could do that + Yeah, but you didn’t
You know the feeling—you see a plain black square painting that goes for $80 million at an art auction and you think, Come on. I could’ve done that.
But you didn’t.
They did.
They knew what was worth doing, when, and how to frame it so it mattered.
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... See moreSari Azout • Becoming unLLMable
Much of art’s greatness is felt on a gut level. Your self-expression allows the audience to have their own self-expression. If your work speaks to them, it is of no consequence if you are heard and understood.
Rick Rubin • The Creative Act: A Way of Being
A person must have experience, he must live, if his artistry is to be more than a technical accomplishment. He cannot find the subject matter of his artistic activity within his art; this must be an expression of what he suffers and enjoys in other relationships — a thing which depends in turn upon the alertness and sympathy of his interests.
The Marginalian • John Dewey on How to Find Your Calling, the Key to a Fulfilling Vocation, and Why Diverse Interests Are Essential for Excellence in Any Field
Although the most powerful art, it sometimes seems to me, is an experience and a going-through; it is love comprehended by, expressed and enacted through the artwork itself, and for this reason has perhaps been more frequently created by people who feel themselves to be completely alone in this world—and therefore wholly focused on the task at hand
... See more